Let’s stop and think about our country and divert our attention to other countries which is what? Middle East countries; let’s say Iran, which underwent extreme changes, prior to 1979’s Islamic Revolution with Shah running the country, he allowed Western influence meaning women had rights to many things they wanted. But after Shah was overthrown, Khomeini took over and he drastically changed Iran to the point where NO one had a freedom of speech and women lost many rights: they are no longer equal to men; marriage age was dropped from 18 to 9 year old girls!; men were allowed to have “temporary” wives; women had to wear scarves and body cover or chador to cover everything but eyes; if a hair strand showed, women were flogged, jailed/or fined; etc. I could go on and on with what was happening in Iran during the 1980s and 1990s but my utmost point of all is: this country, our country, the United States of America gives us many rights: hearing, deaf, African American, etc. So PLEASE do not minimize the issue of freedom of speech, etc. MZ has every right to express her opinions just as others do. MZ has every respect for anyone’s point-of-view. She is only a journalist who has best of interest wanting to do the best for our deaf society. The issue of CI/ASL/ORAL/BIBI… you-name-it will always exist rest of our lives, even before we were born.

I was born late 1959 and was raised as an oralist but I paid a price for this kind of background i grew up. I envy Deaf children growing up in a deaf family. I also envy hearing parents using ASL with their deaf babies. I even got involved with AGB but during that time I started learning ASL and AGB looked down on me to the point where I was very uncomfortable. They were trying to oppress me but I wouldn’t allow that stop me from learning ASL. Slowly, my deaf identity began to bud like a blooming flower; especially when I started my education at Gallaudet. I did not appreciate AGB group who “oppressed” me, but that is who they are and they truly think they have valid points. What can we do about that? Forget them and focus on how we can “teach” hearing people how important it is for little deaf kids to maintain their rights of freedom of speech! Our little deaf kids have their rights as well! If they are deprived from ASL I believe it is a cruel form of oppression. I think it is our job to teach hearing people. Don’t you think so?

When Gallaudet issues arose thus a protest began, it was about how worried many students/staff/faculty were that new technology would take over and we all will lose deaf culture, blah blah… Please! Gallaudet has always had deaf students entering deaf culture for the first time in their lives and rediscover themselves as a deaf person with deaf identity. That is the most important thing! Oral deaf students learning ASL for the first time… that will happen to deaf students with CI entering Gallaudet’s deaf culture for the first time in their lives.

anyway i dont want to go off the point of deficit thinkers/deficit thinking; again, we do have a right to express our opinions. Think about it, Iran or other Middle East countries do not have freedom of speech. We should be proud of our country who gives us freedom of speech. Let’s not be so cruel and quick to put down other people. Life is too short. We do need to listen to other opinions, perhaps we will learn something new, eh? Life is all about learning experiences.
How about setting up a way to make a law out of this: allow deaf babies, deaf children have their rights to ASL whether they have CI or not. It’s important to be loud and clear with this subject. Create a group and approach our Congress or our lawmakers and try to pass a law allowing deaf babies their rights to communication which is ASL. Deaf babies should have their freedom of speech.

gotta stop now…but i wish you happy holidays!

i want to thank u for raising this topic

i think it would be very worthwhile to have a discussion during the DeafRead conference re: Deficit thinking and blog/vlog positings

i thank u because ur first comment was a SUGGESTION for a DISCUSSION

as a result alot of dialogue and yes debating has been happening which has prompted an indepth analysis of what deficit thinking is

at the same time i want to share with u from my heart that i am not comfortable endorsing a ban

banning and book burning is for the fascists

if u desire to have an aggregator that fosters like minded discussions and can screen out trolls and sabators (sp?) i think there are systems out there that could be tapped into

i am also uncomfortable with ur use of pretty sweeping and heavy labels of “sickos” and deficit thinkERS - this shifts the conversation from dialogue and discourse to hostile rhetoric and name calling

i have refrained from posting any comment here because i did not want my words to be misunderstood; however, i feel it is important to share my thoughts and feelings with u

i care for u

i care for all u have done and do for the Deaf-world

i want u to continue being a great advocate that u r

i only ask u consider amending ur initial blog entry above so it reflects the need for dialogue on how to respond to blogs / vlogs that may be damaging to D/deaf people vs. banning and labeling individuals

thank u for considering this

i commend u for taking a stand for that which u believe in - i only ask that u come from love and understanding first and foremost

“we must be the change we want to see”

i wish u all the best

peace

patti durr

You are not telling me anything new.

However, censorship and banning only create more problems. We do not have a monopoly on people’s thoughts. This is America where people are entitled to exercise their rights of expression, whether we agree with them or not.

We can have constructive dialogue with them. However,if they refuse, that’s their prerogative. Don’t bother reading their blogs if you don’t care for their messages. Don’t waste your time with them. Controversy only draws attention to their blogs. In other words, you are encouraging other people to read their blogs.

Continue to educate people who are receptive in learning about deficit thinking and reframing. Keep the big picture.

I understand that we should have constructive dialogue with deficit thinkers and I welcome them.

But it is those certain deficit thinkers that are not really interesting learning anything and prefer poke fun our desire to improve what has been denied for over 100 years.

I am sorry that you are disappoint in me but thousands and thousands of deaf people are disappointed that these deficit thinkers’ ideology are getting a free pass. And must we continue to be passive?

John

This is not the answer, John. We live in America where free exchanges of ideas and thoughts are permitted, regardless of how we feel about their ideologies

This is Brian and how you know me amazes me. I don’t even know anyone in Indiana, so how you get this info is mute at best.

John, you can do your best, but you can’t remove deficit thinkers. It is these people that keeps everyone on their toes and to explore other avenues of thinking. Imagine if there were no deficit thinkers, you would run out of things to say. Think about it.

As for trash talking and bashing, I’m sorry, you all see it that way, but that was never, ever my intension. I was just making points and expressing what I thought, if you see it differently, well, what can I say?

I agree with #16, we are all in this together weather we like it or not. Even the people at AGB. They help in their own ways and have done more good than bad. So, you don’t agree with their methodology, cool, no problem, but don’t trash them for doing what they think is a good cause.

“And I am not the only one that have concerns about those deficit thinkers, many have complained about these sickos too.” Ummm, who are you calling sickos? Do we kill or mime? Do we destroy lives? I don’t think so. The former leader of Iraq was a sicko. How do we compare to that? Now, talk about trash talking… Painting a good picture of yourself? You wanna know something? I like what you have to say for the most part and have great ideas. You can be a little one-sided, but that is you and how can we, deficit thinkers, ever change how you think? We can’t and guess what, we are not even going to try! So, don’t try to change our way of thinking. Educate us, yea maybe, change us, ha, good luck.

Like John always asks, #6, who are you? You have the gall to publish our names in front of everyone, but have no guts to mention who you are? Sounds yellow to me? BTW, keep my kids out of this, ok? They have no right to be looked down on cuz of what their parents think. Cool?

Maybe, I’m wasting my breathe here cuz I don’t even think this will get published, none of my other comments in the past has.

Happy Holidays all of you!
Gary